![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lomonaaeren“Do you understand why you have detention with me, Potter?”
“No, sir.”
Severus paused. Before, Potter had always at least pretended respect, including writing lines or scrubbing cauldrons or whatever chore Severus had designed for him without complaint. He had even refrained from speaking to his snake during the time that he spent in Severus’s office, although she seemed to hiss on.
But now, Potter was facing Severus with his head held slightly up and his eyes narrowed into surprising slits.
“You do not?”
“No, sir.”
“Then I shall explain it to you.” Severus leaned forwards a bit. Potter continued to stand his ground, even though his “ground” was only a meter of space in front of Severus’s desk. “You recklessly endangered your own life by going after the troll.”
“What should we have done instead? Sir.”
“Get a professor, as has been explained to you multiple times by now—”
“We were in the midst of running away from the troll, sir, and we would have achieved that if not for the staircase swinging around. Where in the middle of that did we have time to get a professor?”
“You will be assigned another detention for cheek, Potter.”
“I haven’t complained about your unfair grudge against me, sir, because I was sure it wouldn’t do any good. But this kind of thing could endanger other people as well as me. Are you going to put students in detention for falling off their brooms during Quidditch practice? For falling off the staircases as they swing around? Sir.”
Severus stared at him. Potter stared back.
“You are close to earning yourself detention for the rest of the year,” Severus warned him softly, but it sounded as if his heart weren’t in the words, and Potter promptly took advantage of that.
“I only requested an answer to the question, sir. It seems that you want to punish me for doing the right thing.”
“The right thing would have been calling a professor!”
“In the middle of running away from a mountain troll, sir?”
Severus ground his teeth. He could say what the real reason behind the detention was, why Minerva had pushed for it and Severus had agreed, but the concept that adults were worried about him and that worry was emerging as anger would probably sound foreign to Potter.
And, if it did not, it would push him to do more stupid things.
“Students would not be punished for falling off brooms or staircases,” Severus finally said.
“What if I did it?”
“You would not be punished,” Severus said, unwillingly. Where was the line between telling the truth and unwittingly giving Potter permission to do more stupid, reckless things?
“Thank you, sir. That’s all I wanted to know.”
And Potter turned around and went over to the waiting parchment, quill, and inkwell Severus had set up for him as if all his questions were answered.
Severus returned to his own work, but he couldn’t help sneaking a glance at Potter now and then. Potter worked steadily, and although his snake sometimes hissed to him, Potter didn’t hiss back that Severus could hear.
It seemed Severus would have to change his mind about Potter yet again.
This was fast becoming an annoyance.
*
“Mr. Zabini, will you please take that Augurey out of my classroom?”
“Sorry, professor. But it gets lonely if I do that. And hungry.”
Minerva stared at Mr. Zabini. He looked back at her with an apologetic expression, while the chick in his satchel made another moaning sound.
“It is interrupting my class,” Minerva tried.
“Can you cast a Silencing Charm on the bag, Professor? Sorry, but I don’t know how to do that one yet.”
Minerva narrowed her eyes, Mr. Zabini continued to look apologetic.
It was odd, Minerva reflected as she cast a Silencing Charm over Mr. Zabini’s bag and then watched closely to make sure that he didn’t spend too much time peering into it and cooing at the Augurery chick. Ever since the death of the troll, Harry and Miss Granger and the Slytherins who had followed them into that battle were…
Well. They were not cheeky, not exactly. They just asked questions that hovered on the very edge of disrespect. Minerva hadn’t seen anyone tread that line so skillfully since Remus Lupin had been in school.
Minerva tucked away the aching memories of the Marauders, two dead at one’s hands and the other two who might as well be dead, and watched carefully as Harry bent near Miss Granger’s desk to help her. Mr. Weasley was watching them with a face that was slowly turning purple. Minerva walked towards him.
She had given Mr. Weasley a stern talking-to after the tale of how Miss Granger had ended up in danger from the troll, and taken points from Gryffindor. Mr. Weasley had seemed startled and upset that Miss Granger had been rescued by Slytherins, and had apologized—sincerely, as far as Minerva could tell—to her and to Miss Granger.
But he did still act as though he expected Miss Granger to sit with the Gryffindors, and Minerva had heard a few arguments outside of class. She could only do so much unless they happened in front of her, however. In class, she took all the precautions she could by attempting to head them off before they started to form.
“Mr. Weasley.”
Mr. Weasley jerked and looked at her, but his eyes slid back to Granger and Harry and the other Slytherins soon enough.
“Mr. Weasley. Look at me when I am talking to you.”
They were receiving more of an audience for this than Minerva had wanted, given the number of students who had turned around at her stern voice, but perhaps that was what Mr. Weasley needed. He swallowed, some of the color draining from his face.
“Professor?”
“You haven’t yet completed today’s Transfiguration, Mr. Weasley. Focus on it, and show it to me before the end of class.”
The challenge was perhaps a little unfair, since most other people wouldn’t finish it by then either, but Mr. Weasley probably needed it to keep his mind off a situation he had caused.
Reluctantly, Mr. Weasley raised his wand and turned his eyes back to his own desk. Minerva turned to face the other side of the room.
Harry was watching Mr. Weasley with narrowed eyes and a cool expression on his face that made him seem older than he was. However, when he saw her watching, he gave her a bashful little-boy smile that Minerva didn’t buy for a second, and waved.
Minerva gave him a slight smile and kept patrolling the room. Rivalries or not, danger or not, her first priority right now had to be the safety of the students in front of her.
*
I just can’t believe that she sits with them as if she doesn’t have a care in the world. Doesn’t she know they’re going to turn on her at any second?
But Granger, smart as she was, didn’t seem to know that. She chattered and laughed with the Slytherins, and helped them with their homework, and even spent time with them outside class. At least, Ron assumed she did, because he’d looked around for her several times in the library to apologize, and she wasn’t there or in the Great Hall or Gryffindor Tower. Those were the only spots she had ever been outside of class before.
“I just can’t believe that she thinks they’re her friends,” Ron muttered to Neville.
Neville turned to look at him. Ever since the day when he had told Potter that Granger was crying in the bathroom, Neville seemed more relaxed and stronger. He disagreed with Ron a lot, which Ron didn’t mind, exactly, but he would have liked it if it happened less often.
“They are.”
“They’re not!” Professor McGonagall turned towards them, and Ron lowered his voice. “How can Slytherins be friends with someone Muggleborn?”
“I don’t know. How could you torment someone whose only crime was being smart so much that she ran away and hid in a bathroom and almost got killed by a troll?”
Ron opened his mouth, then closed it. His belief that Neville was his friend had just disappeared in something like the kind of fiery explosion Fred and George were always trying to cause.
“I didn’t torment her,” he said at last.
“You made her miss class, and Potter was right, she never does that. And then she almost got killed by a troll.”
“I didn’t know the troll was going to be in the school!”
“But it still h-happened because of you.”
Neville stuttered a little on those words, but he wasn’t stuttering as much as he did usually. He gave Ron a firm nod and then turned back to his own Transfiguration. Ron didn’t think Neville would manage it by the end of class, either, but he was struggling like he didn’t think that.
Ron scowled and faced his own work. That happened to put him in the position of looking at Granger.
She stuck her tongue out at him.
“Professor McGoangall!”
Their Head of House turned and came marching back. “Mr. Weasley, what is it?” She looked a little harassed and distracted, and Ron thought one of the Slytherins must have been doing something, but he had other things to worry about.
“Hermione stuck her tongue out at me!”
Professor McGonagall turned and frowned at Granger. Granger folded her hands on her desk and stared earnestly at their professor. Ron would have given a lot for an earnest look like that. Ginny could do it to their mum, but really no one else in the family could.
“Miss Granger?”
“I didn’t do that, Professor McGonagall. I think Weasley is just ashamed that he accidentally put me in danger and is trying to get me in trouble again.”
Heads turned back and forth across the classroom. Ron looked at other people for help, but only saw entertained faces. He scowled. He knew he wasn’t the only person in Gryffindor who had disliked Granger. He didn’t know why they all pretended not to have seen what had happened, even though some of them must.
The Slytherins sat there with innocent faces, of course. They would back up Granger until the day they ripped her apart for her blood.
Well, most of their faces were innocent. Potter looked like he was choking on laughter. Ron scowled at him.
“Mr. Weasley.”
She’d bought that? Fred and George had always talked about how hard Professor McGonagall was to fool if she actually confronted them, and Ron had been counting on that to make her punish Granger, but she’d decided to be stupid at just the wrong moment.
“She did! I swear she did!”
Professor McGonagall turned to Neville. “Did you see this, Mr. Longbottom?”
“N-no, Professor.”
“Well, then. Two points from Gryffindor for blatantly lying, Mr. Weasley.”
Ron watched open-mouthed as McGonagall swept away. What in the world had just happened? What—
He looked back at Granger.
Granger stuck her tongue out at him again.
But Ron was a fast learner when he had to be, and he scowled and went back to working on his Transfiguration. He would make sure that he got Professor McGonagall to believe him about Granger somehow, though. She could just wait.
*
“Good job, Granger.”
That was Malfoy, who always made it a point to praise her when she did something to Ron. Hermione didn’t know the history there, but praise was nice. It was even nicer when it came from your friends and not teachers.
“Thanks, Malfoy,” she said, her smile wide, and turned back to duplicate her perfect Transfiguration on a second pebble Professor McGonagall had handed her.
It was odd. She’d always been someone who didn’t break the rules, who obeyed even the ones that other kids thought were stupid or tried to convince her to break. A week ago, she wouldn’t have thought that she should ever mock Weasley in class, unless he was the one breaking a rule or not doing his work
But a week ago, he hadn’t driven her into a bathroom with his taunting and almost got her killed by the mountain troll.
Oh, he’d apologized. But it had been a mumble with his eyes on the floor, and had been all about how he was sorry he’d put her in danger. That was better than nothing, of course, and it had seemed to satisfy Professor McGonagall. But he hadn’t said that he was sorry for calling her a nightmare in the first place.
Hermione had noticed that, even if no one else had.
So she had accepted his apology at the time, but then she’d eaten lunch at the Slytherin table that same day. It had been so satisfying to see Weasley’s eyes pop, and then he’d started ranting in an undertone to poor Neville, who had told Hermione that he was glad she was okay and he was tired of Weasley’s ranting.
After lunch, Weasley had tried to confront Hermione about it. “Don’t you know they’re a bunch of blood-prejudiced berks? And some of them are actually evil, like Potter—”
“He was the one who tried to save me from the troll!”
“Yeah, but it’s just so that he can use you later!”
Hermione had stared into Weasley’s eyes, ignoring the way that the people gathered around them in the Gryffindor common room, eagerly waiting for the next bit of drama. They didn’t hate her, she had decided. Parvati and Lavender had even been nice in the wake of the troll incident. But lots of Gryffindors liked fights and yelling and shouting and bravery, and it didn’t matter much to them which person lost, unless that person was a friend.
Well, Hermione didn’t have friends in Gryffindor, unless Neville counted. So she had no one to cheer for her, but also nothing to lose.
“So what would he be trying to use me for?”
“To make his reputation better. Everyone knows that he’s a Parselmouth, the Darkest of the Dark. But it makes him look better to be associating with Muggleborns—”
Hermione had burst out laughing.
There had been silence for a few seconds, while Weasley’s ears turned red, and then a bunch of other Gryffindors had burst out laughing, too. Hermione continued to laugh until her stomach hurt and Weasley started to yell. Hermione couldn’t remember what he had yelled. It had been too ridiculous to be worth remembering.
Wiping away actual tears that had started in her eyes, Hermione had smiled at Weasley and said sweetly, “No, Harry Potter is exactly who he says he is. He doesn’t even lie about his Parseltongue or his disdain for his Boy-Who-Lived fame. If he disliked me, he would let me know it. I would think you would understand that.”
“Ooh, does Ronniekins dislike the Boy-Who-Lived?”
“Didn’t know that, Gred!”
“Me either, Forge. I think we need to investigate this further. It is jealousy of the fame, or the Parseltongue, or the way that he hoped little Harry would be his best friend and had to give that fantasy up?”
“I’m not jealous of his bloody Parseltongue—”
In the distraction caused by the Weasley twins, Hermione had been able to fade towards the back of the common room. A few people had nodded to her and congratulated her, but most of them had been too busy watching Ron and his brothers to care.
Hermione had come to school longing to be popular, the center of attention, but she had seen how much it tended not to work out for people. At least she had friends, and positive attention from the professors, and the fact that she’d survived the troll.
“Can you show me how you did that, Hermione?” Harry whispered.
Hermione beamed at Harry and set about showing him the wand movements. One thing that was nice about the practical side of magic was that someone really couldn’t copy off her. They might be able to do the same wand motions and incantation, but it was up to their wand and their will and their magic whether they could actually do it.
Harry flicked his wand precisely as Hermione had done, and beamed as the pebble on his desk turned most of the way into a button. Salash hissed something, and Harry laughed a little.
“What did she say?” Hermione whispered, after checking that Professor McGonagall was on the opposite side of the classroom. She felt a little thrill as she did it, to be breaking the rules, but then, the professors had already broken most of the rules Hermione thought were important by scolding them for escaping from a troll.
“She said that you obviously don’t mind helping people who treat you right.”
“Of course not!”
Harry smiled at her. Hermione smiled back. It felt so good to be valued.
She would never get upset about worthless people like Weasley treating her stupidly again. She knew what she was worth.
*
“Hey, Harry, can you break the Silencing Charm that McGonagall put on Ashisslam? She didn’t take it off.”
Harry looked up from his book. Blaise stood in front of him, the bag where he kept Ashisslam’s makeshift nest extended. Even as Harry watched, the little Augurey opened its beak and made a silent groan.
“No, can you leave it in place?” Theo interrupted. “At least one person could get a good night’s sleep then.”
Blaise and Harry both ignored Theo’s attempt to start a fight. Harry knew Theo didn’t like Ashisslam, but not really why. The complaints about the noise seemed to disguise something else Theo felt, something Harry wasn’t really interested in talking about right now. “What makes you think I can break the Silencing Charm?”
“Oh, please, Harry.”
“What?” Harry didn’t like the withering look Blaise was directing at him.
“Everyone knows how powerful your wandless magic is. You will things, and they happen. That’s how Salash grew to a size that meant she could kill a troll.” Blaise leaned forwards a little. “Dispelling a charm like this ought to be easy.”
“I mean, maybe for other people. But I think my wandless magic only relates to snakes.”
“What? Why?”
“Salash was the one who had the idea to make her bigger,” Harry said, over the sound of Salash’s hisses as she agreed with him and praised herself. “I sort of worked—in tandem with her to do it. And the only other time that I managed to really control my magic without a wand was related to snakes, too.”
“When was that?”
Harry didn’t need to see Theo’s warning look to know that Theo would be unhappy if he talked about the lamia. He just shrugged. “A couple of weeks ago. It was related to Salash, too.”
“Hmm. So you won’t even try to break the Silencing Charm?”
“You could go ask Professor Snape.” Harry knew well enough that Snape liked Blaise, or at least approved of the way he behaved in class and kept out of trouble the rest of the time, so Snape would probably do it.
“Hmmm.”
Blaise stood staring at Harry, but Harry just picked up his book and ignored Blaise until he left. Salash crawled up Harry’s arm in response. “Why did you not want to try your wandless magic?”
Mindful of the fact that Theo could understand every word they were saying to each other, Harry just shrugged a little. “I don’t want to go around doing more things that makes me special or unique. Or what other people think special and unique are. Parseltongue is one thing. It’s great. And I can’t do anything about people deciding that I’m the Boy-Who-Lived. But I don’t want to do more than that.”
“Hmmm.”
“I didn’t know snakes could make that sound,” Theo said, voice low. Draco was on his bed absorbed in a history book that he’d picked up as soon as Blaise left the dormitory and probably wouldn’t notice.
“She learns a lot of things from other people,” Harry said vaguely, since he still didn’t want to reveal that he’d accidentally taught Salash what a wanker was, and picked up his own book.
He felt Theo’s stare for a few minutes after that, but he kept ignoring it. He couldn’t do anything about people who revered him, but there was no need to make it worse.
*
“Mr. Potter never responded to your letter, Lucius?”
Lucius gave Narcissa a tight smile. Sometimes it seemed as though his wife would pick up on wounds to Lucius’s pride she could have no knowledge of and prick them as expertly as someone digging a needle into a curse scar.
“He did, but it wasn’t a useful response.”
“I see.”
Lucius ignored the way that Narcissa was smiling over the top of her wineglass. She probably thought he should leave the brat alone or some such. Narcissa was very clever in her limited sphere, Lucius thought, but she didn’t know much about politics.
Once he had retired to his study and had a glass of wine to calm his nerves, Lucius took the letter out of its hidden cache again.
Dear Mr. Malfoy,
I appreciate the invitation, but I already decided to stay at Hogwarts for the Christmas holiday. You see, I know that you want to set yourself up as a mentor to me, but I don’t think I need a mentor from just one side of the political spectrum. I need to explore all sides and see what I can find.
And my friendship with Draco is still pretty new, plus I know that this is the first time he’s been away from home for months or even weeks. I’m sure he’ll enjoy having you to himself when he comes home for Christmas.
Thank you again for the invitation. I know this might be disappointing. We can stay in touch if you think it’s worth your while.
Regards,
Harry Potter.
Lucius folded up the letter and slowly placed it back in its hidden drawer. Then he leaned back and took a deliberate sip of wine.
All was not lost. The boy sounded firm and decisive, but also fairly neutral. Not as if someone had warned him against Lucius and he had decided not to visit on that account. Lucius would still be able to place the boy under his control if he dazzled him enough.
But first, he would have to figure out why his first letter, his perfectly crafted trap, had failed.
*
Blaise curled up on his bed, listening to Ashisslam sighing in his nest—Professor Snape had indeed broken the Silencing Charm—and considered what he should write back to his mother. She had written asking how things were going, about any new pets he had acquired, and if he had made friends.
Blaise had no trouble telling her about Ashisslam. That could be the majority of the letter and his mother wouldn’t think anything was wrong.
But although he was sure now that he wanted to be friends with Harry, and that he would be, he didn’t know if he wanted to share that with anyone yet. It was too new, and Harry was the first real friend Blaise had ever had—at least, the first one who was human. So Blaise wanted to hold it close and not breathe a word of it to anyone.
Finally, Blaise nodded, sat up, and reached for parchment and ink.
Dear Mother,
I want to tell you about my new Augurey, who is certainly the best friend I have had so far…
*
“Harry, can I talk to you?”
Harry looked up from where he’d been speaking with Blaise and Salash near the fire. His face was neither upset nor welcoming. Draco took a deep breath and sat down so that he could lean forwards and speak softly. Bad enough that so many people in the common room had witnessed his first humiliating conversation with Harry.
“I’m sorry.”
Harry blinked. “For what?”
Merlin, he’s going to make me spell it out. Only Mother had ever done that to him. But Draco had thought long and hard about what really mattered, and he’d read some history about Muggleborn witches and wizards that Granger had discovered and recommended to him, and so he was prepared to say it. “I’m sorry for using the word Mudblood, and I’m sorry for—making you feel that you were inferior for having a Muggleborn mother.”
“You never managed that.”
“You prat!” Draco exclaimed without thinking. “I’m trying to apologize!”
He flushed immediately afterwards, but Harry was laughing softly, not in a way that made Draco feel worse. “I know what you mean, and I accept your apology.”
“You do?”
“Sure. The way you’ve included Hermione and learned from her and not said that word to her is what tells me you really mean it.”
“But you wanted the apology,” Draco said, testing.
“Yes. But even your decision to make it was an action. The words wouldn’t mean anything without the actions, if I just walked up to you and demanded an apology. You had to decide you wanted my friendship and to be friends with Hermione more than you wanted to be right.”
“Merlin, you’re irritating,” Draco muttered, but Harry just smiled and waved Draco over to the chair next to him.
Draco went with a sense of relief. He hadn’t realized how much he’d missed being included in the conversations that Harry and Blaise and Theo had. And Harry had very definitely not included him, even if he hadn’t said anything after their initial argument.
Maybe that kind of treatment is more effective than punishment and revenge. Maybe.
*
Theo walked through the snowfall, the first deep one of the season, his back turned to the castle that beamed with light and laughter. It was the last meal before Christmas. The train would be leaving on the morrow, and even though Theo had thought about waiting until he was home before he spoke to the Ancestors, he found that he wanted to do it here.
He trudged his way around the lake, not completely frozen but close enough that Theo couldn’t hear any waves lapping, and to the first trees of the Forbidden Forest. There, he knelt in the snow. It was right that a prayer to the Ancestors be made on the edge of two things. It would be even better if it could have been made on the edge of night and day as well, but Theo hadn’t been able to get away at twilight.
He bowed his head and grew his golden scales down one arm, out from under his robe. He would be able to conceal them if someone came after him.
Then he opened his soul, and waited.
Father had taught him when Theo was young not to beg the Ancestors for anything, the way that humans often treated their prayers. That was blasphemy, to a lamia’s mind. The Ancestors had earned their rest and were not to be troubled with the soft realities of human existence.
But if one of them wanted to send a message, Theo would be happy to receive it.
He waited, and a soft voice filled his soul, blending with the falling of the snow and the sighing of the branches.
You will find your path. You need not be the greatest to matter.
Theo sighed and opened his eyes. His legs hurt and his scales ached from kneeling in the cold. He stood up carefully and bowed to the darkness in the woods, then turned and made his way back to Hogwarts.
He thought he understood what the message meant, but he would ponder it to make sure he didn’t have it wrong.
But he thought it meant he could have his friendship with Harry and not worry about the consequences of that to his own standing among his people. Which he would be glad of.
*
“Rubeus, my friend.”
Hagrid straightened up and grinned as he saw Dumbledore making his way through the snow to his door. “Hullo, Professor Dumbledore!”
“Now, Rubeus, I have told you to call me Albus.”
That was one thing Hagrid could never do. He just shrugged and gestured to the hut. “You want some tea? I can boil it up quickly, no problem.”
“No, actually. I have come to ask your help with a vexing question.”
Hagrid stared before he could help himself. “Me?”
“Mm. I have often found wisdom in the most unexpected places, Hagrid, and I believe that you could give me a great deal of it.” Dumbledore’s eyes twinkled at him.
Hagrid took a deep breath. “Well, I’ll do me best.”
“Thank you, my friend. I have an artifact of great power that I could give someone as a gift. However, I am not sure if I should. What if the gift gets misused in the future? So, my question to you is: Do you think I ought to give the artifact as a present, or not?”
Hagrid hesitated. This kind of thinking was beyond him.
But there was Dumbledore, great man that he was, waiting for an answer.
Hagrid finally asked, “Does the—the person you’re going to give this gift to—would they misuse it for sure?”
“I am not sure.”
Well, that was useless, then. Hagrid pondered it some more, and then said slowly, “I think you can’t make decisions based on what someone might do. You have to do it based on what they do do, like. So—you can give it to them if they’ve done things that make you think they’re a good person.”
Dumbledore’s eyes twinkled harder, and Hagrid slumped a little. He’d given the right answer. “Thank you, indeed. That is just what I was thinking myself.”
And he came in and had some tea after all, and they talked about simple and ordinary things like the health of the critters in the Forbidden Forest.
Hagrid was just relieved that he hadn’t failed the exam, although he didn’t know why Dumbledore had wanted to give it to him in the first place. But that was a man like Dumbledore for you. Always some great purpose that Hagrid wouldn’t really understand in his head.
*
Albus took a deep breath of the invigorating cold air as he walked back towards the school. His gaze sought out the lake, which he knew young Harry might be looking at from the windows in the Slytherin common room.
Yes, he thought it was the right decision. Fawkes had left it up to him, for some reason. Young Harry had shown great bravery and restraint and strength of character. He wouldn’t misuse his father’s Invisibility Cloak.
On the way into the school, he passed Quirinus and nodded amiably to him. “Coming to the Christmas feast, Quirinus? After all, you didn’t get to eat any of it last year!”
Quirinus gave his nervous laugh. “O-of course, Albus, wouldn’t miss it for the world!”
“Good,” Albus said, and ambled on his way, mind full of the good he could do and the evil he could prevent.
*
Lord Voldemort sneered after the fool as Dumbledore walked past him.
Let me but regain my body, and I will show you the reasons that you should fear me.
*
“What is it?”
“A cloak that can make me invisible!”
Harry swirled the cloak around his face and stared at his lack of face in awe. He was the only first-year Slytherin boy who had stayed, and one of the few Slytherins altogether, so he could use the bathroom mirrors all he wanted.
“What are you going to use it for?”
Harry took off the cloak and folded it over the arm that didn’t hold Salash. They both watched his arm disappear.
“I don’t know yet,” Harry said. “Not knowing who it’s from makes me a little cautious.”
“As you should be.”
Harry hissed delight at her and then went back to digging into his presents. Gifts! He’d got gifts!
He had real friends, beyond Salash. He had magic. He was making some changes that he thought needed to be made.
But he could put aside the thought of politics for now, and just be a kid on Christmas morning.
The End.
